Hi everyone,
Conveyor belt systems for drying shirts at this point are too bulky and expensive for me, so now I'm looking into flash cure drying units that use infrared. Does anyone have experience with them? Any info would be appreciated. I'm looking into getting something like the model in the top right of this catalog page; http://www.performancescreen.com/58pg59.gif
I onw a little buddy, nice for it's size. Any bbc product is worth the money. They are one of the best if not the best out there. My personal expeience is to flash until the garment smokes. With white on dark, you can do a stretch test. Every garment has a limit so you don't have to put any strength behind anything. So easy does it, grab a part of the printed area between both hands. Begin to stretch it a bit (pull it apart)if it begins to crack, you are under-cured. Dark on light is a little different, the stretch doesn't apply. Stuff your finger into a white garment, and rub it re-peatedly about 8 or 9 times in one direction over a printed part of the garment. If any coloration rubs off onto the white, then again you are under cured. I tend to cure white on light between 310-330 degrees. I cure darkk on lights between 290-320. Hope this helps.
I use a Black Body flash and haven't had any problems with it. Seems built strong enough to absorb some abuse.
As far as using it as a dryer it uses an infrared panel, same as a dryer, but it'll be slower.
so you have one similar to the one in the ad i posted? how long does it take to heatset an item? is there a thermostat where you can select the temperature for it to set at, or do i need to get test strips that show the temperature it achieves to figure out how high to set it initially?
Ideally I want something where I can make a shirt, put it under the flash unit, and it'll be heatset and dried in the time it takes me to make the next shirt, so that my production rate will go up a lot.
If you are going to use a flash to do the "final cure" of your items, you should invest (about $80) in a non-contact temp gun with laser pointer. If you're printing with plastisol, most plastisols cure at about 320°F. Be sure the plastisol reaches the cure temp all the way thru to the bottom, otherwise it won't be fully cured. Also, you should use something other than your printing platen to place the item upon that you wish to fully cure because the platens are not designed to handle that much heat constantly. When flashing plastisol (as in a print-flash-print operation), you only want to "gel" the surface of the plastisol which will usually occour at about 270°F. Much lower than the temps you'll see of about 350-400°F needed to insure the plastsol has completely reached the necessary fully-cured stage.
Without a dryer you'll have to pay closer attention to the heat. I've had to cure shirts with a flash when the dryer broke and this is what I did. I use plastisol ink and about 99% of what I print is on dark (black, green, charcoal). I have a Raytek heat gun like this one Raytek - MiniTemp Handheld Infrared Thermometer - MT2, MT4 so I can make sure the ink reaches a minimum 320 deg for at least 10 seconds. Usually the shirt will come out of the dryer at about 500 deg though so don't be afraid of higher temps. Too long in the heat can scorch the shirt or cause some blistering or puckering in the ink. You'll know it when you see it. The heighth of the flash over the shirt will be up to you but I put it about 4" high so it wouldn't be flashing so much as curing.
And if you're printing on darks like me I had to use the flash to flash the underbases and do all the printing and when that was complete I used the flash to cure all the shirts. That was a HUGE waste of time. If you can get a conveyer dryer do it, even a used one is better than not having one.
Thanks for all the info, guys. For the record, I'm using water based inks, not plastisol. So would something like the black body flash cure unit, placed a few inches above the shirt, heatset water-based ink prints well? How long does it take? and mike, thanks for the link on the temp gun. My father has one like it for no real reason, just bought it for fun (geek).
I found that just now. It seems to have pretty good information for anyone like me interested in getting a flash cure unit.
It says that infrared is best for curing plastisol, but I would like to use it for water-based inks. Does anyone on here have any experience using an IR system to heatset water-based inks? I'm wondering if it just takes longer than it would with plastisol.
It says that infrared is best for curing plastisol, but I would like to use it for water-based inks. Does anyone on here have any experience using an IR system to heatset water-based inks? I'm wondering if it just takes longer than it would with plastisol.
I'm curious about this too. Is there any way to speed up the curing process for water based inks? It is extremely time consuming iron each print. I would love to be able to set the print without having to iron.
I'm curious about this too. Is there any way to speed up the curing process for water based inks? It is extremely time consuming iron each print. I would love to be able to set the print without having to iron.
Thats a nice unit. When I first started I was using Speedball w/b and assumed my heat press would cure..and it worked. I dont know how well tho', I still have one of my first shirts with speedball and it has a crackly ,faded look to it...I assume it is because of the ink.
Flash Cure Units? 
